


the season of the heart

by foxwatson



Category: Bill & Ted (Movies)
Genre: (yes), Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Anyways, Christmas Fluff, Hanukkah, Holidays, I MEAN. READ IT AND FIND OUT, Inspired by Hallmark Christmas Movies, M/M, and then these two childhood friends were reunited as single fathers during the holiday season, can the warmth of the hot cocoa rekindle their love?, dad feelings!, in a world where ted actually got sent off to military school, reunited friends, so many tropes they'll be coming out of your ears i promise dude, ted logan's dad problems!, that's right it's the hallmark au!
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-15
Updated: 2021-01-15
Packaged: 2021-03-12 19:40:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,670
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28765707
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/foxwatson/pseuds/foxwatson
Summary: Ted Logan hasn't been home for the holidays since his father sent him away to military school his junior year. His dad and Deacon have always come up to Alaska to visit - but this year, Chet needs help moving, and Deacon won't be coming home, so Ted returns to San Dimas for the first time in 14 years, his daughter Billie in tow. Meanwhile, Bill is usually too busy with his successful career as a session musician to make it home for Hanukkah, but this year, he was determined to give his daughter Thea a real Preston Family Hanukkah. Being home always makes him think about Ted - but he hasn't heard anything from him in years. Will a little holiday magic be all it takes to bring the two old friends back together? Or will their busy lives and long distance pull them apart again once Christmas is over?
Relationships: Ted "Theodore" Logan/Bill S. Preston Esq.
Comments: 9
Kudos: 38





	the season of the heart

**Author's Note:**

> title credit to it feels like christmas, from the muppet christmas carol. yes i did that. it's a beautiful song and it makes my heart warm.
> 
> the only warning for this fic is like. heads up for chet's general shittiness, sorry, i write about terrible dads to cope

The Old Logan house looks just the same as it did when Ted left it behind over a decade ago. Squat and unassuming, pushed back from the road enough to allow for a decent-sized yard. His dad hasn’t done much to keep up the outside, but it’s not so run-down anyone would really notice unless they were looking closely. Ted, still steeped in his memories, can easily see the chipped paint around the windows, the rust at the base of the mailbox.

Billie leans up into the front seat beside him, following his gaze, and then whips her head back around to look at him. “Is this the house?”

“Yeah, B, that’s where I grew up. Grandad’s house.”

“Before you moved to Alaska,” she says, turning back to look at the house.

“Yeah,” he tells her softly, placing one hand on the top of her head and smoothing it back over her hair.

“Looks a lot warmer here,” she tells him with a grin. “Gonna be weird not having snow at Christmas, though.”

Ted nods, and pats her again before pulling his hand back to the steering wheel so he can pull properly into the driveway. “Thanks again for being such a good sport about that, B. About - all this stuff. I know it’s gonna be weird spending the holidays away from home.”

“Well Grandad needed our help.” Ted watches her face fall a little in the rear view mirror. “Anyways - Alaska’s not that great. You always make San Dimas sound so cool, Dader.”

There’s something wistful in her voice, and Ted immediately, reluctantly, feels responsible for it. He knows he never quite managed to settle in Alaska, and that he’s told her an awful lot of stories about California sunshine and palm trees, surfing and the warmth of the ocean and the rides on the boardwalk. He probably made it hard for her to settle in, too, with his own restlessness.

Maybe coming back will give him some closure, though - and maybe if it doesn’t live up to either of their expectations, they can go back home and be a little happier with what they’ve got.

He finally climbs out of the car and opens the door for Billie, letting her hop out into the sunshine and stretch her legs. She does a little spin and looks up at him, and he ruffles her hair a little before he takes a deep breath and walks towards the door.

As soon as he steps out of the car, though, he catches sight of the tree in the yard - and just like he knew he would, he thinks about Bill. They used to climb that tree - or Bill would get Ted to boost him up, and then pull him up after. Over by the house are the bushes where they used to play the world’s shortest games of hide and go seek. And there, through the window, he sees the living room where he and Bill used to sit on the floor and watch TV.

Ted turns, and for a minute, it’s almost like he can see Bill there in the yard, still dressed in his half-shirt and ripped jeans, waiting for Ted to run over and join him so they can go over to his place for band practice.

Those years are long behind both of them, though. Bill probably doesn’t even come home to San Dimas for the holidays anymore, busy as he is being a studio and touring guitarist for some of the best bands in the business. Ted’s proud of him, anytime he sees something online or in the music news about his old friend. Every time he’s getting stock for his little record store or deciding what to purchase for himself, if he can find Bill’s name in the liner notes, he buys the CD.

Ted just wishes he still knew how to get back in touch with him.

Billie comes over beside him and tugs on his shirt. “Dader? We gonna go in?”

He looks down at her and sighs, then nods. “Yeah, sorry, B. Just thinkin’ about stuff.” He puts a hand on her back and walks with her up to the door, and he gives her a little nudge to let her be the one to ring the doorbell.

Chet answers the door, and looks first at Billie and then at Ted. “Well, you're later than I thought you’d be.” He steps back to usher both of them inside. “Come on in. I doubt you’ll get much done today, but we can go over some things so you’ll know what I want you to do. Wilhelmina, you can go sit down in the living room while your dad and I talk.”

Ted walks with his hand on Billie’s shoulder, and leaves her at the couch with a kiss on the head. “Sorry, B,” he tells her softly, and she just shrugs and shakes her head.

“Don’t worry about it Dader.”

“We’ll stop for dessert or something on the way back to the hotel, okay?”

She grins at that, and nods, “Okay.”

He leaves her there on the couch - making a silly face as he turns the corner to make her laugh one last time before he follows his dad back further into the house.

“I’d like you to start with the attic, if you can,” Chet tells him. “There’s a bunch of old junk left up there from while your mother was still here. Then you should clean out your bedroom at least, and maybe help me with Deacon’s, although your brother should really be here to do it himself.”

“I’m here because he couldn’t be, Dad,” Ted reminds him with a frown.

“Or wouldn’t be,” Chet mutters.

Ted sighs, determined not to lose his patience when they’ve barely gotten started. “You said you want me to start in the attic? Me and Billie can head up there and see what there is to see. You can stay down here so you don’t have to worry about it.”

“Well unlike some people, I have to work, so I’m just going to leave you to it. They need me at the station."

Closing his eyes, Ted bites back the argument he always wants to make - that owning his own record store is work, even if his dad doesn’t seem to think so. Still, he’s used to the dismissal at this point, because he gets it every year when Chet comes up to visit, and he knows it just isn’t worth the trouble. “Don’t worry, Dad. Billie and I will take care of it. If we leave before you get back, we’ll make sure to lock up and leave the key wherever you want, okay?”

“Fine, fine. If you find any of that junk in the attic and want to keep it it’s all yours. I certainly don’t want any of it. And don’t bother pulling down any of the holiday decorations unless you want to deal with them, I never mess with any of that.”

“Alright,” Ted tells him softly.

His father looks at him for a moment, really looks, for the first time since Ted got there. Then he sighs. “You could have at least cut your hair. Sometimes it looks like you haven’t cut it since you left Oats’.”

Ted resists the urge to fidget with his own hair, and instead just sighs again, looking away. “If I hadn’t cut it since I left Oats’, Dad, it would be a lot longer than this.”

With a skeptical hum, he goes back out towards the kitchen - and Ted just follows him. They go through the keys, and Ted gets the one for the front deadbolt while Chet takes the car keys he needs to go in to the station.

“Don’t leave it under the front mat when you’re done. That’s a surefire way to get my house broken into. Hide it under the bush on the left side of the door, the second one, not the first. Call me at the station to tell me you’ve done it, once you’re back at your hotel.”

“Yes, sir,” Ted says dutifully, turning the key around in his hand, brushing his fingers along the familiar jagged edges of it.

His dad nods at him, eyes narrowed, and then puts on his hat and jacket as he goes to leave. “Don’t leave the house a mess.”

“Yes, sir,” he says again, and he watches as Chet finally walks out the door.

Ted can feel the tension leave his shoulders as soon as his dad is out of sight - like the further away he is, the more his body can remember how to relax. He sticks the key in his pocket and then quickly rubs his hands over his face before he goes back into the living room and flops down onto the couch next to Billie.

“Is Grandad gone?”

The idea that he didn’t even say a proper goodbye to Billie makes Ted quietly furious - but he reaches out instead, wraps an arm tight around his daughter’s shoulders and kisses the top of her head. “Yeah, B, he’s gone. Just us now, trying to get some stuff cleaned up for the afternoon. He had to go to work.”

“Well, that means we can play music and stuff, right? And we can make it fun.”

Grinning, he huffs out a little laugh and shakes her shoulders a little. “Yeah, it does. I probably still have some old cassettes in my bedroom, you wanna go see if you can find them? I don’t think I left any records here, but I might have.”

“You got it, Dader!” She hops up and smiles, then looks towards the hallway and turns back around with a frown. “Which one was your room?”

“Here, I’ll show you,” he tells her, guiding her down the hallway with a hand on her back. The door to his old room is closed - and he half-expects to push it open and find that his dad’s gotten rid of most of his stuff already, or that it’s at least been repainted, or the walls have been stripped.

Instead, his room looks exactly like it did when he left for Alaska. Anything he managed to bring with him, or anything he asked Deacon to bring him later, is missing, of course - but all his action figures lay scattered and dusty over his shelves. His Van Halen poster is hanging right over his bed, still stuck firmly to the ceiling. Even his bed is musty, but still left unmade.

His dad really just - never comes in here. He just left it like this for Ted to find - to force him to come home and take care of it himself. Ted sighs.

“Whoa!” Billie says beside him, hopping onto the bed and bouncing a little as she looks around at all the toys, and his old acoustic guitar. “Dad, this is so cool!”

He smiles, and laughs a little as he sits beside her on the bed. “You think so?”

“You have so much cool stuff in here! Can I have some of it? If you don’t want it anymore?”

She looks up at him all earnest, wide-eyed with excitement, and he nods at her immediately. “Of course, B. Just ask me first, but - we’ve gotta go through all this stuff anyways. I don’t know if we’ll have room for all of it, but you can take some of it home if you want.”

“Excellent!” She chirps at him, and then she hops up off the bed and goes over to one of his shelves, tracing her fingers along the front as she looks at all the toys. Then, carefully, she picks up a framed picture and carries it back over to Ted, holding it out to him. “Is that you?” she asks.

His dad was never really the type to keep a photo album - and the move to Alaska, with so much left behind, always meant that Ted only had a spare few photos of himself with his mom, or with Deacon, scattered around the house in frames. It means he doesn’t have a lot of photos of himself in high school, and none he’s ever shown Billie.

This one, though. Ted’s grip tightens on the edge of the frame, and he blinks down at it. It’s a picture of him and Bill, the day they’d finished painting their practice space in Bill’s garage. They’re both air guitaring happily on either side of the logo. Ted remembers that Mr. Preston had been the one to take the photo, and that Bill had later given him a copy as they talked about how important a historical moment it was - their first practice as a real band.

Ted resists the urge to tear up, and laughs a little as he brushes his thumb over Bill in the photo. “Yeah, that’s me,” he says, finally, his voice rough with emotion.

“Who’s the other person?” Billie asks, her eyes wide as she peeks at the picture.

“That’s uh-” Ted clears his throat, struggling to find his words for a second. “That’s Bill. My best friend. He used to live in San Dimas, you know, we grew up together.”

“The one I’m named after?” Billie asks, leaning in closer to the photo, narrowing her eyes like it’ll make it better quality, or get Bill closer to the camera.

Unable to speak for a moment, Ted just nods at her.

“Does he still live here?”

Shaking his head, Ted finally makes himself put down the photo, and stop looking at it. “No, B. He’s - a real musician now, he does backup guitar for a lot of really famous bands.”

“And you guys used to be in a band?”

He nods at her. “Yeah, B.”

“...Until you moved to Alaska.”

“That’s right.”

Billie turns on the bed and looks at him - and the shrewd focus in her expression suddenly makes her look a lot older than just 10. “Did you wanna move to Alaska?”

He always promised himself that he would tell his daughter the truth - and he’s never outright lied to her. There are things, though, he’s found himself trying to steer away from, trying to protect her somehow from things he didn’t want to have her know until she was older. This was one of them, so he’s never tried to bring it up. He’s always let her assume he was somehow involved in the choice to go to Oats’.

Now, though, faced with the fact that she seems to have figured it out on her own, Ted shakes his head and sighs. “No, B. I really didn’t. Your grandad kind of - made me.”

She frowns. “That’s bogus. Why’d he do that?”

It’s a question Ted’s asked himself, more than once. He huffs out a laugh and shrugs, reaching over to rub at her back, trying to comfort her. “I don’t know, B.” And truthfully - he doesn’t. He knows, still, what his dad told him. That it was about learning to be respectful, about authority, about his grades and the fact that he didn’t try hard enough - but Ted has Billie now, and if there’s one thing he knows, it’s that he could never do to her what his own father did to him. No matter how bad her grades got, no matter how much she didn’t listen - he could never just send her away like that. He loves her so much, and he could never put her through anything even remotely similar.

In that way, having Billie has actually made him have a lot of uncomfortable realizations about the way his own father still treats him - but it’s not a burden he intends to pass on to his daughter.

“That was a long time ago now, though, B. Before I finished school, or met your mom, before you were born.”

“Before you had the store?” she asks, and he nods and kisses the top of her head.

“Exactly.” He stands up and stretches, leaving the framed photo still sitting on the bed. “Now do we wanna get some music going or what?”

She hops up, and nods at him, and they both find separate areas of the room to start digging for any wayward cassette tapes, just so they have something they can stick in the stereo and listen to. After a prolonged search, Billie jumps up with a cheer, cassette tapes in both her hands, held over her head.

The selection isn’t great - but there’s one Van Halen cassette, one Queen, and a couple of old mixes. He takes them all from her with a muttered, “Thank you, B,” and they take them out to the living room, to the old stereo. It’s dusty, and clearly rarely used now - mostly probably just so his dad can listen to the radio.

Ted blows the dust off, though, and opens the cassette tape intake to slide in the Queen cassette. He pushes it closed again, and turns up the volume, and closes his eyes as the opening sounds of “One Vision” roll over him.

With the music all set up, Ted pulls open the door to the attic, and tells Billie to stay downstairs or on the ladder to be careful as he climbs up.

The attic is as dusty and box-filled as he feared - because again, it’s clear his dad hasn’t even really been up here.

“I’m just gonna bring some boxes down there, okay B?” he calls down.

“Sounds good, Dader!”

After all - the attic is probably a little dangerous even when it’s well-maintained, with the empty spaces between beams only filled in with insulation and stuff, not sturdy enough to take weight. There’s not really enough space to comfortably fit both of them, and Ted just doesn’t want Billie to have to mess around in all this dust and maybe set off her allergies or something.

He grabs a few boxes, stacked on top of each other, and brings them back down the ladder, grateful that it’s slanted enough he can make it down without using his hands.

With a tug on the top box of the stack, he realizes he grabbed the holiday decorations first on accident, and he sighs as he climbs back up the ladder and digs for another good stack of boxes.

“Dad, wait - does Grandad wanna get rid of the decorations?”

Ted ducks his head back out of the attic, looking down at Billie where she’s standing in front of the boxes with her hands on her hips. “Uh - well, I don’t know. He said he never uses them, but we could put them up if we wanted to.”

“Maybe that’s why he’s in such a bad mood,” Billie mutters.

Laughing, though he tries to do it quietly, Ted leans back up and blinks away his dizziness. “He’s just never been much for Christmas, B. You know that.”

“But maybe it’s just hard to get the decorations up and stuff on his own. What if it actually would cheer him up?”

It’s almost impossible to imagine his father being cheerful, no matter what he did or what his house looked like - but he and Billie are going to be spending a lot of time here, too, throughout the month, and Ted doubts they could do much decorating back at their hotel room. Besides - Billie’s idea is so genuinely sweet, and so well-intentioned that Ted finds himself willing to suspend his own disbelief for her. Maybe just this once, his dad would appreciate it.

Wiping the dust off his hands, Ted climbs back down the ladder and looks down at the boxes of decorations. “Well - I think there should be some lights and ribbons and stuff but - some of this is ornaments, so we’d have to get a tree, too. I don’t think I saw a fake one up there.”

“We should get a real tree anyways, we always do.”

Ted tilts his head, and smiles. “That’s a good point, B. What do you say we take a break, then? We can go grab some snacks, pick up a tree, and then we’ll come back and decorate before we go back to the hotel for the night.”

Billie nods at him, eagerly, and he reaches his hands out for a hi-five before they make their way back to the car.

* * *

Every year, Bill tries to make it back home to San Dimas in time for Hanukkah and Christmas - and for the past handful of years, he hasn’t managed. He and Thea have spent their holidays in hotel rooms or rental places, getting take out or going out somewhere with decent food. He’s tried to always make sure they can light a menorah, always managed to find her a dreidel or some chocolate gelt, given her a present each night - but he’s always felt like it wasn’t quite the same.

Now, this year, he spends the whole flight home, watching Thea sleep, thinking about how he’ll be able to dig out the old Preston family menorah and put it up in the window. They’ll even have a real kitchen, and now that she’s old enough maybe he can teach her how to make latkes.

Plus, he’s excited just to be home. He keeps the house in San Dimas and refuses to move because he keeps thinking that maybe someday he’ll stay - and this is where he wants to stay, when he can. If he could ever find a real band to stick with, find a way to focus on his own music again, maybe they could just stay in one place. Thea could go to a real school, and they could stop traveling for tours or short-lived gigs all the time, and they could just live in San Dimas.

He feels silly, though, making holiday wishes on nothing. It’s nice to be able to make money from his music, and nice that he and Thea have gotten to travel so much together. She always has fun, and she always seems happy - Bill just worries.

The plane finally starts to descend, shaking Bill from his thoughts as he catches sight of the city and the palm trees through his window.

“Dad - are we home?” Thea asks, stretching out her arms with her eyes still closed, her fist bumping up against Bill’s shoulder a little. 

He looks over at her and smiles, and ruffles her hair. “Yeah, Thea, we’re home. You excited to be home for Hanukkah?”

She grins, still sleepy, and scrunches up her face. “Totally. It’s gonna be most excellent, can’t wait.”

It’s obvious she’s still tired, and he laughs a little as she finally starts to open her eyes and glares at the light coming in through the window. Then, her eyes adjust and her expression quickly changes, shifting into a wide-eyed grin at the sight of the airport and the palm trees.

“Oh, Dad we’re like - actually home!”

“Yeah,” he tells her, still laughing. “Just gotta drive home from the airport now, then we’re all set.”

She bounces in her seat the rest of the way to the ground, and then all the way to the gate. Bill finds that her excitement is a little bit contagious, and he can’t stop himself from grinning, even as they get stuck pulling their luggage down from the overhead bins and waiting in line behind everyone else on the plane.

The airport is hectic, this close to the holidays, so Bill keeps a close eye on Thea, a hand on her head or her shoulder, or tugging gently at her backpack all the way to the baggage claim. It’s nice to see all the family reunions, people running into each other’s arms, happy to be together after so long apart - but it almost gets Bill thinking about not having anyone there to greet them. Instead of letting himself dwell, he squeezes Thea’s shoulder again, and ruffles her hair just to make her huff at him.

They grab the rest of their luggage, though, and then thankfully they’re on their way to the car.

Just as they’re stepping out of the building, though, Thea catches sight of the holiday decorations and elbows Bill, looking up at him. “Are we gonna do Christmas, too, this year? Or do we just do that when we’re not at home?”

Bill thinks for a moment, and shrugs. “Well, we can do both if you want. I don’t see why not. I have a feeling you just want more presents-”

“Well I don’t think you can prove that,” Thea answers him with a smile.

He laughs, and takes her bag from her as they reach the car, tossing their things into the trunk and the backseat. “Sure. If you wanna do both, we can do both. We don’t have a tree or anything, though.”

“Guess we gotta get one, then,” she tells him as she slides into the back and nudges her feet up against the back of his seat.

“Maybe tomorrow, T. I think today I’m gonna have to say Dad needs a rest day.”

“If we pass anywhere on the way home, though, then you could rest all day tomorrow. Since we already had to be out today, and you already have to carry stuff-”

He groans a little, just to make her laugh, and then turns on some music as he gets the car started to make his way out of the parking lot. “We’ll see.”

As a matter of fact, it turns out they do pass somewhere on the way home - the place where pretty much everyone in San Dimas gets their trees, a vacant lot right down the street from the high school. Bill spares a glance further down the road as he parks the car, feeling the shadow of his own memories creep up on him - but again, he’s easily distracted as Thea hops out of the car and throws her arms out towards the trees.

“Choices galore, Daderino!”

“We can’t get anything too big,” he tells her, putting his hands on her shoulders as he steers her towards the trees. “Our house isn’t gonna fit the tree from Rockefeller Center. And remember that we’re the ones who have to put the lights and the ornaments on it, so the bigger it is, the harder it’s gonna be to decorate. It can’t be so tall we can’t reach the top of it.”

“No taller than me on your shoulders height, got it,” she tells him with a nod.

It’s right then, that out of the corner of his eye, Bill sees some other dude with his daughter in the parking lot, tying a tree to the top of his car. They catch his attention at first because of the similarity in dynamic - the way the girl is standing there, cheering on her dad as he shakes his head and tries to figure out how they’re going to transport a tree that clearly would have been better suited tied to a van or a truck.

He looks a little closer, though, and the guy seems - oddly familiar. His long, dark hair falls into his eyes, and when he shakes it out of the way again, he laughs a little, his smile big enough it lights up his whole face. He tugs on the rope at the top of the car again, and when it doesn’t give, he goes over and hi fives his daughter, wiggling their fingers together.

It’s in that moment that Bill realizes who the guy makes him think of - he looks just like Ted.

Bill can’t exactly say he hasn’t thought of Ted in years, because actually, he thinks about Ted all the time. He thought about Ted when he saw the high school, and he thought about Ted when they landed in San Dimas. He thinks about Ted every time he listens to Van Halen, or air guitars with Thea, or every time he does anything particularly cool, like playing a really good riff, or getting to meet one of his heroes.

He hasn’t spoken to Ted in years, though.

As much as he wishes he could have done something to stop Ted’s dad from sending him off to Alaska - wishes things would have worked out with their band faster, so maybe they could have found some way out, none of that happened. More than anything, now, he just wishes he knew if Ted was still in Alaska, or if he had moved somewhere else - or even if he’s happy.

It is silly, though, because if Ted wanted to look him up, by now, he probably could. Bill’s listed in the phone book and stuff, to make sure people who want to hire him can get in touch. It’s not like any of his contact information is a secret.

Ted probably just went to school in Alaska and got focused on his studies and forgot all about their old band and all the rest of that stuff. He’s probably out there somewhere being a totally respectable adult.

Only for some reason - the thought makes Bill a little sad.

He looks back over at the guy with his daughter, and finds that the car is already pulling out of the parking lot, headed for the road, and some unknown house in San Dimas. Maybe Ted turned out more like that guy. Maybe he grew his hair back out, and he had a kid, and he still smiles the same way he used to whenever Bill made him a bracelet or surprised him with a new idea for Wyld Stallyns merch.

Maybe Ted’s still out there somewhere.

“Did you fall asleep standing up again?” Thea asks, tugging on his arm a little.

“When have I ever fallen asleep standing up?” Bill asks her, frowning.

“Right then, probably,” She tells him, grinning. “You totally zoned out!”

He rolls his eyes at her, but smiles. “That dude in the parking lot reminded me of someone, that’s all, T.”

“Oh - that tall one? He looked kind of like that dude you had the pictures with. He was the one I’m named after, right? Ted?”

Bill flushes a little, and looks back at the empty parking space, his brow furrowed. “Yeah. That’s what I thought, too, actually.”

“But he lives in Alaska, right?”

With effort, Bill manages to nod at Thea and finally shake himself out of it, grounding himself with the knowledge that she’s probably right. Ted probably is still in Alaska, and this was just some tall guy with dark hair and a nice smile who lives in San Dimas. After all, if he was only visiting, why would he be buying a Christmas tree?

“Good point, T,” he says, turning back to face her. “Now let’s put that good thinking to work finding a tree.”

Thea nods at him, grinning. “Excellent plan, Dad.”

After careful consideration, they end up settling on a tree that’s a little bigger than he had originally planned, but he’s pretty sure he and Thea can reach the top of it, still, if they work together. They manage to get it tied to the car, and Bill is grateful that for the next couple of days he’ll have the distraction of trying to decorate the house and the tree for Hanukkah and Christmas after he’s unpacked.

Mostly because all the way home - he can’t stop thinking about Ted.

* * *

Once the tree’s been wrestled into the house and set up in the living room, Ted stands back to look at it with his hands on his hips. Billie stands next to him, matching his pose, and when he tilts his head to consider if the tree is crooked, so does she. 

He laughs a little, and goes to put a hand on the top of her head. “Well, what do you think, B?”

She nods. “Looks good. Now we just gotta decorate it.” When she turns to look up at him, she grins - and then furrows her brow, putting on a more serious, determined expression.

Though he has to fight down his own smile, Ted furrows his brows to match her expression and nods back at her.

Ted turns the stereo back on, and turns the music up as Billie starts digging through the boxes for decorations. They get out the tinsel and the ribbons, all the ornaments and the lights for the tree. He hangs the ribbon around the windows while Billie gets the lights untangled, and then he has her help as he wraps the lights around the tree branches. They work together to put the ornaments on, and he watches Billie’s excitement grow as the tree really starts to come together.

There’s other decorations for the house, stockings and things like that in the boxes, and they pull those out, too, finding places to hang everything up.

Buried under almost everything else, though, hiding under the lights for the outside of the house - Ted finally finds his mom’s old tree topper.

It’s an angel, all golden and beautiful, sheer metallic fabric and upswept wings. He pulls it delicately from its tissue and holds it gently in his hand, blinking down at it. He can’t remember the last time they pulled this down and actually used it. It’s possible it hasn’t seen the light of day since his mom left.

Billie comes over beside him and leans over his shoulder, looking down at it, too. “Whoa. Are we gonna put that on the tree?”

Ted brushes his fingers gently over the fabric of the angel’s robe, and then smiles. “Yeah, I think we should. It’s my mom’s old tree-topper. We used to use it when I was a kid.” He looks at Billie, then. “But - the most important part, B - when you put it up there, you gotta make a wish, okay? That’s the deal, every year. When you put the angel on, you make a wish.”

Her eyes going wide, Billie reaches out, and Ted moves the angel closer so she can touch it. “Is it like - special?”

“Your grandma seemed to think so,” he tells her. He stands up, and then gently hands Billie the angel. “You want me to pick you up so you can put it on the top of the tree?”

She nods, eagerly, just like he knew she would, so Ted carefully grabs her by the waist and hefts her up, walking over towards the tree.

“Here you go,” he tells her, once they’re in reaching distance. Then he lifts her a little higher, tilts her closer, and she manages to set the angel right on the top branch, keeping it steady with her hands as it settles into place.

He shifts back, and sets her down, and they both stand there looking up at the top of the tree.

“Make a wish, B,” he reminds her, and she nods and closes her eyes tight.

It’s silly, and he knows it’s silly, but standing there looking up at the angel, he feels just enough like a kid again that he feels like he should make a wish. He can still hear his mom’s voice in his ear, her quiet, “Make a wish, Teddy!” before she’d wrap him up in a hug and distract him, pull him in the kitchen to finish decorating cookies or helping with dinner before his dad came home.

At first, he’s not sure what to wish for - and then Bill pops back into his head. Maybe it was the photo Billie found - or maybe it was that guy with the blonde curls Ted had glimpsed out of the corner of his eye at the Christmas tree lot. Either way, he closes his eyes, and sighs, and wishes, just to himself, that he could see Bill just one more time. Just enough to talk to him, and know that he’s happy, and wish him good luck.

“Did you make a wish, too?” Billie asks him, tugging on his arm.

He opens his eyes, and watches the way the angel twinkles in the sunlight still streaming in through the window. “Yeah, I did,” Ted tells her.

“I hope it comes true, then.”

Though he flushes and rubs a hand over his face, a little embarrassed with himself, he laughs. “Yeah, me too.”

Fortunately, Billie gets excited again after that and pulls Ted from his own thoughts. There’s still the lights to put on the outside of the house, after all. They take all the supplies outside, and she spots him on the stepladder as he works his way around the front, hanging up the lights along the front of the roof, right by the gutters.

Back in Anchorage, he and Billie only have an apartment, so he’s never had the chance to decorate the outside of a house this way. He finds it kind of exciting, the way all his hard work pays off when he steps down off the ladder and looks down along the front of the house and sees all the lights hanging down. Even though it’s not dark yet, he can imagine how they’ll look all lit up, and he smiles.

He’s exhausted, though, once they’ve put up all the decorations - and he can tell that Billie’s a little bit worn out, too. They didn’t get much cleaning done today, but Ted knows they have until the end of the month, and he can take a little of the heat from his dad just to know that the house looks nice and Billie will be a little happier for it.

“I think we’ve had a pretty big day,” he tells her, pulling her close and rubbing at her back. “What do you say we grab some dinner and dessert and head back to the hotel?”

As she nods, she yawns a little, and tries to hide it behind her hand.

“Yeah. Sounds good,” he says, and he ruffles her hair as he goes to clean up.

The empty boxes go back in the attic, but he makes sure to push them aside so he’ll know where to start when they come back tomorrow. He closes the attic door back up, and goes back in his room to make it look like he got a little work done - neatening some of the shelves, shaking out his comforter and making the bed.

He sneezes, in the face of all the dust, but just laughs and shakes it off before he goes back out to the living room.

There’s no denying that the house looks a little happier with the tree and all the decorations. It looks warm and lived-in in a way it didn’t before he and Billie got there - and Ted smiles to see it. He can’t remember the last time his dad’s house felt this comfortable. He has no idea how his dad’s going to feel about it - but he’ll probably find out soon enough.

“Come on, B. Let’s go home, huh?” he says, taking her hands and tugging her up off the couch, nudging her towards the door and the car.

Just outside the house, he pauses to hide the key in the second bush on the left, and then he’s in the car and headed for the hotel, hoping to find a restaurant on the way. 

They end up stopping at a diner not far from the old high school, because it’s convenient and familiar. Ted still remembers when everyone used to go there after school, or walk there to grab lunch if they were old enough. He and Bill had only ever really picked up food from there, orders of fries to split during band practice, but he still finds it comforting to walk inside and recognize that so much of the decor hasn’t changed at all - even if some of it is covered by tinsel and paper snowflakes.

He and Billie sit down in one of the old vinyl booths, and the seat crackles underneath him. He encourages her to get a milkshake, and she does happily. He also ends up getting to enjoy the rest of it when she can only finish about half.

Once they’re fed, they make it back to the hotel, and she flops onto the bed while he dials the number for the police station on the little hotel phone.

“Captain Chet Logan speaking,” his father answers.

Ted sits down on the bed and starts toeing off his boots. “Hey, dad. I left the key in the bush, just like you asked.”

“I said under it, Ted, not in it.”

Resisting the urge to laugh, Ted places a hand over his eyes. “Yeah, that’s what I meant. We - uh - mostly we worked in the attic today, but we went ahead and put up the holiday decorations, too, because Billie thought you might appreciate it. She says it makes sense you wouldn’t wanna do all that by yourself, but she thought it might - cheer you up if we helped out a little.”

For a moment, his father is silent. Then he hums. “Guess we’ll see when I get home. I’ll see you both in the morning, 7:30 sharp before I go into work.”

Before Ted can even try to argue or tell Chet he can’t remember the last time he woke up before 9 AM - he’s met with a dial tone. He hangs up the phone and then falls back on the bed, staring up at the ceiling.

Billie soon comes over and flops next to him, elbowing him in the side. “Was that Grandad?”

“Yeah, B.”

“Does he like the decorations?"

Ted sighs and ruffles Billie’s hair. “He hasn’t seen them yet. I’m sure he will.”

Billie sits back up and shrugs. “Well, either way they were good. I liked them. We did a good job.”

He smiles at her. “Yeah, I think we did, too. What do you say we watch a movie or something? We’re gonna have to go to bed a little early, because your grandad wants us over there again tomorrow egregiously early, but - I promise we’ll find something cool to do tomorrow night or this weekend to make up for it, okay?”

“Okay, dader.” She leans against his side for a moment, and he hugs her tight.

“Wanna see what’s on TV?”

She nods - and they settle together on his bed to flip through the channels until they find The Muppet Christmas Carol. They leave it on while they both get ready for bed, and Ted leaves it on even after Billie falls asleep, enjoying the songs and his own nostalgic fondness for the Muppets, although he grew up with the older special.

Even though he hates to do it, he sets an alarm for the morning, and as he watches Billie sleeping, he hopes she can still get plenty of rest before the morning.

* * *

In the morning, when he stumbles downstairs and into the kitchen, the house is quiet. After they got home from the Christmas tree lot, Bill had barely managed to wrestle the tree inside and into its proper place before he felt totally wiped out. He got the rest of the luggage in the house, but he didn’t even really unpack before he told Thea goodnight and crashed out in his room. Now, he’s awake earlier than he usually would be from falling asleep so early the night before, and Thea’s still sound asleep. He takes the chance to make his coffee slowly, and to sit in his own kitchen and enjoy the moment to himself.

He and Thea are always staying in spaces so cramped neither of them really get a lot of alone time, and he knows she’s starting to get old enough it’s grating on her. In a couple of years, she’ll probably ask to stay home in San Dimas if he has to go somewhere, and while he knows she could stay with Missy, he hates the idea of leaving her behind. It’s part of why he wants to find a way to stay in San Dimas - but he’s still not sure what he’d do if he did. Take the recording gigs close to home, of course, and stop going on tour, but what else? What’s here for him?

In spite of his best efforts, he feels like he’s sort of avoided San Dimas because of all the memories it still holds.

Maybe if he could just see Ted one more time, or even hear from him, it would make it a little easier to settle in San Dimas without things feeling so totally heavy - without Bill having to feel so haunted.

Once he finishes his coffee, and eats his breakfast, Bill goes back out into the living room and looks at the tree. He knows he can’t start decorating it without Thea or she’ll be totally upset, so instead he just pulls everything out of their storage closet and sets up what he can. He places their menorah in the front window, and puts the boxes of ornaments by the tree. He’s just starting to wonder if he can put up any of the outdoor decorations when the phone rings.

“Bill S.-”

“I can’t believe you got home yesterday and couldn’t even call your own mother,” Missy says as soon as he answers.

He sighs, but smiles in spite of himself at the joke. “Does it help at all if I tell you I totally crashed as soon as we got home?”

“You know I’m only teasing, I know travelling wears both of you out.”

“Well one of us, anyways,” Bill tells her. “Thea made me stop for a Christmas tree yesterday, too. I had to get it in the house plus all of the luggage, so I was like - beyond exhausted by the time I got in.”

“In that case, no wonder you passed out. Maybe you’re forgiven after all.” Bill can hear her fumbling with something on the other end of the phone - maybe just moving the phone from one ear to the other. “I thought you guys were doing Hanukkah this year, though? I was excited for more leftover latkes.”

Bill laughs, still able to fondly remember Missy’s attempts to make latkes before he’d started taking over for Preston family Hanukkah celebrations. “We’re doing both. I told her on the plane that we could, and she decided that meant we had to have a tree as soon as possible.” He sighs and glances over towards Thea’s room, but still doesn’t hear any movement. “We were both too tired for decorating last night, though, so once she wakes up today we’ve got a lot of work to do.”

“Hm.” Missy says, pausing to consider. “You want me to come over and help? I don’t have anything else going on, and I’m sure it’ll go faster with three people. Plus, I’d love to see both of you.”

“Oh yeah,” Bill says quickly, lighting up at the idea of having Missy’s help with decorating - and with Thea, and with everything, really. “I’ll make breakfast and stuff. Thea’ll be most excited to hear you’re coming over.”

“Aw, did she miss me?” Missy asks, teasing a little.

“Yeah, she did,” Bill tells her. Then, flushing, thinking of the family reunions he watched in the airport and how much he genuinely considers Missy family at this point, he pushes on. “We both did.”

“Bill - that’s very sweet.” She pauses for a moment. “I still want you to make breakfast, though.”

He laughs, and fidgets with the phone cord. “Yeah, okay. See you in an hour or so? By then I should be able to make something, and maybe Thea’ll be up.”

“Sounds good. See you soon!”

Once she’s off the phone, Bill hangs up with a smile. Although he isn’t always the best at expressing it, still, he genuinely loves Missy. She’s not exactly like his mom - more like his older sister or a cool aunt, but they’ve stayed close even after she left his dad, and she’s always been happy to watch Thea whenever he needed help. He knows he should probably do more when he’s home to show how grateful he is - he’ll have to get her something nice for Christmas this year to say thank you.

The first thing a search through the fridge and the pantry reminds him is that actually, he’s in desperate need of groceries. Fortunately, there’s pancake mix, and if he makes it with water it’ll be enough of a breakfast to please Thea, and hopefully Missy as well. There’s plenty of syrup, too, still in the cabinet.

He’s finished mixing and started cooking by the time Thea comes plodding out of her room, eyes still half-shut.

“Pancakes?” she asks, sitting down at the kitchen table and blinking over at him.

“Pancakes,” he tells her.

She hums, and then lays her head down on the table, resting it on her folded arms.

He smiles, then turns back to the stove, carefully using a spatula to flip the pancake he’s got in the pan. “Guess who’s coming over later to help us with the tree?”

“Mm, dunno,” Thea mumbles - but then the tone seems to hit her and she perks up, lifting her head. “Wait, is Mimi coming?”

“Mmhmm,” he tells her, grinning. He still finds it cute that Thea’s never outgrown the childhood nickname she had for Missy when she couldn’t quite pronounce her name. Missy’s always embraced it, though, seemingly happy to practically adopt Thea as a grandchild.

Thea jumps up, then, though, and races back to her bedroom. “I gotta get dressed!”

“You know she’d just tell you your pajamas are most fashionable,” he calls after her.

“Yeah but I wanna look nice! I just got all that cool stuff in New York, I want her to see it!”

He smiles down at the pan, flipping another pancake to place it on the growing stack next to the stove.

When Thea comes back out, she has her hair done up in butterfly clips, and she’s wearing an old vintage Fair Isle sweater and denim skirt with suspenders that they found in a thrift store in New York. The sleeves are a little too long on her, but she just pushes them up as she sits at the kitchen table, kicking her feet now, clearly awake and a little more excited.

“Go ahead and grab some pancakes if you want, Missy should be here soon.”

She eagerly takes him up on the offer, grabbing a plate to fill it up with the already finished pancakes, then drowning them in syrup. “Your pancakes are always so much better than hotel pancakes, Daderino,” she tells him, grabbing a fork as she takes everything back to the table.

“Well I hope so. Hope I haven’t gotten totally rusty.”

“No way,” she tells him, her mouth already full. He thinks about giving her a hard time for it - but she’s grinning at him with a mouth full of pancakes, and it’s way cuter than it should be.

Instead, he just shakes his head and laughs at her and goes back to his cooking.

Missy gets there once the two of them are both settled at the table eating, with plenty of pancakes still left over for her.

Thea runs to answer the door for her as soon as the doorbell rings, and by the time Bill follows to catch up, Missy’s already standing there in the doorway with Thea’s arms wrapped around her hips.

“I missed you so much - you would love New York, Mimi, have you ever been?”

Missy smiles down at her and rubs at her back. “I haven’t, actually. I’ve never been that far East, but I’d love to go someday. We should make it a girls’ trip when you’re older.”

Pulling back, Thea grins at her. “I’d love that. I could show you so many cool places Dad and I went. And especially if we went at Christmas, there’s so much cool stuff to look at - there’s so many nice stores, Dad took me so many places. There’s so many thrift stores, I got this sweater, and the skirt, and I got other stuff too - do you like my hair clips?”

“I do, they look perfect. You’re getting great at doing your own hair. I’m proud of you.” Missy kisses her on the temple and then pats her again before she walks over to Bill and reaches out her arms. “C’mere.”

He rolls his eyes, but he goes gladly and lets Missy pull him in for a short, tight hug. “How are you?” he asks her.

“Perfectly fine, Bill. I can bore you with that later.” She kisses him, too, on the cheek, and then pats his face as she pulls away and walks into the kitchen. “Now show me the pancakes, I can already smell them.”

Thea comes up beside him and then tugs him by the arm back into the kitchen. All three of them settle around the table, and Bill watches Thea excitedly tell Missy all her New York stories while Missy listens with her chin in her hand and a smile on her face. It’s a strange little family they’ve got, but it leaves Bill feeling warm anyways, settled in their breakfast nook, tucked up against the window. He misses this whenever he’s not home - continental breakfast, even at the nicest hotels, never feels like this - never feels like  _ home _ .

Once they’re all done eating, Missy directs the two of them through decorating the tree, helping to coordinate the tree and keep the ornaments even and well-distributed. She helps Bill put on the tinsel, and hang the lights and ribbons around the house. She even helps with the outside of the house, too, and helps Bill lift Thea up so she can place a ribbon on the light outside their front door.

Once they’re done decorating, the outside of the house looks nice, but the inside looks perfect - warm and cozy, plenty of blue and gold to coordinate well with the menorah in the window. Missy’s made sure it all ties together perfectly, and Bill’s loves how homey it all looks, suddenly, even though they’ve only been back for a day.

“Thank you,” he tells her, glancing over at her.

“Oh you don’t have to thank me, we had fun.” She turns to Thea with her hands on her hips. “Right Thea?”

“Right,” Thea says, nodding.

“But now - you don’t happen to want a nap, do you?” Missy asks her, narrowing her eyes a little.

Thea rolls her eyes. “You wanna talk to Dad about adult stuff.”

“You are so smart,” Missy tells her, absolutely genuine. She kisses Thea on the forehead, wipes the lipstick mark off with her thumb, and then pats her on the back. “I promise, after you go in your room for like, 20 minutes tops, I’m gonna take you shopping. You guys need groceries, your dad needs a break, and I need to get you some cool stuff for Hanukkah and Christmas.”

That makes Thea brighten again, a smile spreading over her face, and she hugs both of them tightly before rushing off to her room. “Okay! Twenty minutes.”

“I feel like I should tell you that you don’t have to take her shopping,” Bill tells Missy as he sits down heavily on the couch.

“And I feel like you should know by now that I wouldn’t do it if I didn’t want to. You should relax a little.” She sits down on the other end of the couch and crosses her legs, leaning her elbow up against the back cushions. “I know how hard you work when you’re on the road. You used to call me all the time when you thought you couldn’t do it, and you  _ told me _ how hard it was. I’m glad you figured it out, but I know that doesn’t mean it’s easier, it just means you got better at it. So when I can help, I like doing it.” Reaching out with her foot, she kicks him gently in the knee. “Now tell me about all the handsome men in your life, let me live vicariously.”

Bill laughs and flushes, turning his head. “Missy, c’mon. I always tell you this, I never meet anybody when I’m working.”

“You were in New York! How do you not meet anybody?”

He shrugs. “Busy in the studio, busy with Thea when I’m not, you know.” Unfortunately - that’s the exact moment he remembers the guy from the Christmas tree lot. His flush deepens, and Missy nudges him with her foot again, repeatedly, catching the look on his face. “There wasn’t anybody in New York, there was just - I saw this dude at the tree lot yesterday, it’s stupid.”

“It’s not stupid, c’mon, spill.”

Sighing, he slouches on the couch. “He didn’t even - I just saw him from like, across the parking lot, I didn’t get his number or anything. He just-” Bill crosses his arms. “You’re gonna give me shit for this, I know it.”

She grins at him, and scoots closer. “Promise I won’t. Now tell.”

“He just - do you remember Ted? From high school?”

“Ted Logan? Like the two of you asked me to prom together Ted? Of course I remember Ted.”

“Well you know - he left, like junior year, he left San Dimas and I never saw him again but - this guy kind of reminded me of him.”

“Oh, Bill,” Missy says softly, scooting in close enough to squeeze his arm. “I didn’t realize - that whole summer, you were miserable. You hid in your room all the time-”

“Yeah,” Bill says quietly, ducking his head and rubbing at his face. Then he laughs, just a little. “Long time ago, though.”

“You really cared about him,” Missy says.

“Yeah. I did.” Then, forcing himself out of it, Bill sits up properly. “That dude wasn’t him, though, he was just - Ted’s still in Alaska, I’m pretty sure. This was just - some dude with a daughter, and he had a nice smile, that’s all.”

“Hey, with a daughter?” Missy says, poking him in the arm. “There’s not that many single dads in San Dimas, I could ask around.”

Bill shakes his head, firmly. “No, it’s okay. Don’t - don’t worry about it. He may not even live here, he might have been just - passing through, you know? No way to track him down.”

A silence settles between them, and Missy’s eyes turn big and a little sad as Bill tries to avoid her gaze. This time, when she nudges him, it’s gentle. “You know I could always ask Chet what happened to Ted. If he’s still in Alaska. If he ever got married. If you wanted to know.”

He blinks in surprise. “But you hate Chet.”

She shrugs. “Yeah, and? It’s one question. I bump into him all the time. Let me ask. If you decide you don’t wanna know, I just won’t tell you.”

An answer to all his passing questions is just way too tempting to resist. Though he shrugs back at her, and shakes his head, finally he agrees. “Yeah, okay. Don’t - go out of your way or anything but - if you see him around or get a chance - it’d be nice to know. Where he ended up, I guess, if nothing else.”

“Done,” Missy tells him with a grin. “Now I’m gonna spare you all my boring date stories, and take your daughter shopping. Have a nice afternoon in, and tomorrow - take her to do something fun in San Dimas. You’ve both earned it.”

She hops up off the couch, and goes to get Thea from her room, and Bill just leans back against the cushions, hands pressed over his face.

He’s already regretting, just a little bit, what he’s agreed to. But - all the talk about Ted did give him an idea for somewhere to take Thea on their day out tomorrow. At least there’s that.

* * *

As it turns out, Chet’s first response to the Christmas decorations is to tell Ted that the lights on the front of the house were crooked. 

Ted doesn’t really know what to say to that.

“The tree looks… fine,” his father says, after a long moment of silence.

“Thanks, dad,” Ted tells him gently, enthusiasm only slightly dampened. Of course - he didn’t really expect his father to thank him for the hard work, but even Ted realizes that him telling his dad thank you for not reacting poorly is more than a little bit silly.

His and Billie’s first full day of cleaning goes surprisingly well. They put the music back on, and take occasional breaks for dancing and meals, or just to sit and watch TV for a little bit. They make it through a couple of boxes in the attic - some of his mom’s old left behind stuff, old papers that can mostly be thrown away. There are some clothes that Billie decides to keep, so they set them aside in a box to take back to the hotel to go through a little better.

All in all, it’s a pretty calm day, but Ted immediately starts to feel a little bad that this might be all Billie sees of San Dimas if Ted doesn’t do something about it. If he doesn’t take a few days off from cleaning, make a point to take her to do something fun once in a while, all she’ll see is the inside of their hotel room and the inside of the old Logan house. So much for the California sun.

It’s obvious from their phone call that night that Chet expects Ted to keep going the next day - and maybe they’ll do a little, in the morning - but instead, Ted tucks Billie up under his arm in the hotel room and asks, “Hey, do you wanna do something fun tomorrow?”

“Like what?”

He shrugs. “I dunno, B. Have you seen anything that sounded interesting? Anything you wanna do.”

“Well - there was a thing at the tree lot about some kind of light display in San Dimas? Maybe we could go tomorrow after we get done at Grandad’s.”

It’s not exactly what Ted had in mind - but he does know exactly what Billie’s talking about. Not because he saw the same ad, but because he remembers the old light display in the park from when he lived in San Dimas - he and Bill used to go every year.

He looks down at her face, feeling torn, and finds the kind of genuinely eager, hopeful little smile he can’t possibly say no to.

He sighs. “Okay. Lights in the park it is. But next time - let’s figure out something fun we can do in the daytime, too, okay?”

She nods, happily, and he squeezes her tight. They fall asleep watching The Shop Around the Corner.

They pass another long morning in the Logan house - but as soon as it’s the afternoon, Ted nudges her. “You wanna go grab lunch? Maybe go to a museum or something before we go see the lights tonight.”

“What kind of museum?” Billie asks.

Ted laughs. “I dunno, actually, I don’t know if there are any in San Dimas, but - mostly I just think we deserve a break, don’t you?”

She smiles at him and nods. “Yeah, okay.”

They go to a pizza place downtown for a nice, long lunch. It’s one of Ted’s old favorite places, and from what he remembers, the pizza’s still just as good, if not better. It’s still got an arcade attached, too, so Ted gets them both a whole bunch of tokens and lets Billie stand on his feet to play pinball for as long as she wants. There’s not really a convenient arcade in Alaska - he’s taken Billie to one or two, but never regularly.

Now, he teaches her to play a fighting game and lets her win. They play their way through the Ninja Turtles game for a while, until they both lose, and laugh about it. They play air hockey, and Ted makes sure he hits the puck gently enough she can hit it back and neither of them get hurt. She gets in a pretty good hit anyways that nearly bruises his knuckles, but he just laughs and takes it in stride.

By the time they run out of tokens, it’s late afternoon, and the sun is already heading towards the horizon. He figures they’re close enough to sunset to make their way over to the park, so they find a place to park and then walk over.

As they approach, the lights are on, but only just visible in the fading orange light. It’s nice, but not quite as pretty as when the sun has set and the lights are clear. 

Ted can hardly pay attention to any of that, though - because instead, he immediately sees the spot that was always his and Bill’s favorite, the big tree right in the middle. There are lights all around the base, set up to look like instruments, and golden music notes weave their way up the trunk.

He walks a little closer with Billie’s hand still in his - and then he stands there staring long enough that she tugs at his arm.

“Dad - you good?”

He turns to look down at her and shakes his head. “Yeah, B, I’m fine, I just-” He glances around. There’s only a few other people here this early. Besides, San Dimas is small, they’re early in the season, and he’s tall enough to see all the light displays. “This is my favorite one, B. I wanna stand here a little bit. Why don’t you go look at the other lights if you want? Don’t go too far, though, and if an adult tries to talk to you-”

“Come right back, I know.” She grins at him. “Thanks, Dad!” She squeezes his hand once, and then runs off, heading for another light display.

He turns back and looks at the tree again.

During the rest of the year, even when the lights weren’t up, he and Bill used to come here and sit either on the bench or right under the tree. Sometimes they’d bring their guitars and practice, sometimes they’d read comics - any time they couldn’t be at Bill’s, didn’t want to go to the Circle K, and thought Chet might be home at Ted’s, this was their place. Assuming it hasn’t grown over or been rubbed away, somewhere on the base of the tree, there’s a little carved Wyld Stallyns logo - just a WS in the old Van Halen font style.

Ted’s stands there for a few minutes with his hands shoved in his jacket pockets, just staring like he’ll be able to make out the carving in the dark. Then he sighs, and turns to leave - and bumps right into someone, almost headfirst. At least, it would have been headfirst if the guy wasn’t so much shorter than him.

Still, Ted reaches out, steadies his shoulders, and then steps back a little. “I’m sorry, dude, I - wasn’t really looking where I was going.”

“No, it’s fine, dude, I-”

Only then, the guy looks up, and their eyes meet. The pale green is already startlingly familiar, but Ted just blinks, certain he’s missing something. He checks over the familiar golden curls, the small, heart-shaped mouth, the strong point of his chin, the defined jaw - even the shape of his nose.

“Bill?” Ted says softly - at the exact moment that Bill says, “Ted?”

“I thought you were in Alaska,” Bill says, his voice rough.

Ted nods, and then shakes his hair out of his face. “I - would be. I’m just home to help my dad clean out the old house.” He starts to pull a hand out of his pocket, then realizes he wouldn’t know what to do with it and shoves it back in. “I thought you’d be - travelling. I didn’t know you ever came back.”

“Well - I can’t, most of the time. This year I had the chance and we both wanted to, so-”

“We?” Ted asks - knowing there are a thousand other things he should ask, or do, or say, but too caught up on that to think of anything else.

“Uh - my daughter."

Ted looks to where Bill gestures and realizes that standing beside him, there’s a girl almost exactly Billie’s age. She has blonde curls piled on her head, and she’s wearing an oversized sweater with the sleeves pushed up. She waves. “You’re Ted,” she says, smiling at him.

“Uh - yeah,” Ted says. He looks around, then, and sees Billie’s already on her way back over, grinning.

“Hey, it’s Bill!” she says, rushing up beside Ted and linking her arm with his. “Hi, Bill,” she says with a little wave.

Bill waves back at her, and then locks eyes with Ted again.

“This is Thea,” he says, at the exact same time that Ted says, “This is Billie.”

They both flush, and glance away, towards their daughters, then down at the ground. Any embarrassment he feels from Bill finding out about his daughter’s name is totally swallowed by the pleased fluttering he feels at realizing that Bill did the same thing. At some point, Ted remembers, they’d talked about it in passing, maybe even as a joke - but apparently both of them meant it.

“Nice to meet you,” Billie says, waving at Thea as she leans around Ted.

“You, too, dude!” Thea tells her, grinning. “Dad, can me and Billie go look at the lights?”

“Oh - yeah, can we, Dader?” Billie asks, looking up at Ted. 

He pulls a hand out of his pocket finally and gives her a shaky smile as he pets over her hair. “Yeah, of course, B, if Bill says it’s okay for Thea to go, too. The two of you stick together, same rules I always give you, okay?”

“No talking to strangers, stay in sight, come running for help?” Thea asks, looking over at Billie, and Billie nods and grins, obviously delighted.

“Yeah, go ahead,” Bill tells Thea, patting her gently on the back. “Like you said, you know the rules. Just seriously - don’t go too far, and come back before too long, okay?”

“Okay, Daderino,” Thea tells him. She smiles, and waves at Ted, and then goes over to link her arm with Billie’s so they can make their way through the lights. He watches the two of them walk away, heads ducked together as they laugh about something, and he smiles.

Then he remembers Bill is standing right beside him, and he glances over again, finding Bill’s eyes locked on his face. He flushes, and ducks his head.

“That was you at the tree lot, wasn’t it?” Bill asks, still quiet. “I thought it was just - some dude that looked like you.”

Ted recalls, again, the guy with the blond curls he’d seen standing on the other side of the parking lot. He blinks. “Oh. Yeah, I guess so, I - I thought I saw you, too, for a second. Then I just thought I-” Ted doesn’t know how to finish the sentence without giving away how much he’s been thinking of Bill ever since he and Billie came into town. He shrugs, instead.

“Thought you were seeing stuff. Because you thought it couldn’t be me, just like I thought it couldn’t be you,” Bill finishes for him, smiling a little.

He laughs, shaking his hair out of his face. “Yeah, I guess so, dude.” Ted starts walking, slowly, trailing after Billie and Thea, and Bill falls into step beside him. He keeps glancing over, just hoping that he’s hidden enough that Bill can’t see how much he’s looking - but Bill looks so good. His hair catches the light in a truly resplendent way, and his smile has just the same shape as it always did, a little heart shaped because of the dip of his cupid’s bow. His chin sticks out when he’s grinning, and Ted’s heart does the same little flutter he knows it did as a teenager.

“So you - stayed in Alaska? And you have a daughter?” Bill prompts him, nudging him a little with his elbow.

“Oh, yeah, well - uh. After I got out of school, I-” Ted cuts himself off with a huff, trying to find the least heavy way to fill Bill in on everything that happened after they fell out of touch. “Well I couldn’t really come home. And I guess I thought I should get married, and Liz was a really good friend, so - we did. And we had Billie. But I was more - interested in the family thing than Liz was, it turned out, and I was fine raising Billie on my own, so we split up, and she moved back to England, and then I opened my own record store, in Anchorage. And that’s pretty much where we’ve stayed ever since - just me and Billie. It’s just us.”

“You actually got married?” Bill asks, really pausing to look at him.

Ted laughs, his shoulders hunching up around his ears. “Yeah, I know, it was - I guess I was just kind of trying to make my dad happy, you know?”

Bill frowns a little - which is exactly the kind of reaction Ted was trying to avoid, but there’s not much he can do about it now. “You’re really down here helping him move? After everything?”

Sighing, Ted scuffs his shoe along the stone walkway under their feet. “Deacon couldn’t do it. He - and this is the kind of thing I can’t tell Dad, obviously, but he met this guy and it’s their first Christmas together, and he can’t - exactly bring him home, you know? Doesn’t wanna scare the dude off before they’re even together through one holiday.”

“Oh,” Bill says. He stops for a moment, and blinks. “Well - good for him?”

“Yeah, the dude seems nice. Deacon brought him up for a visit, like - guess he thought Alaska might make for a romantic vacation or something. But maybe he wanted me to meet him, too, since things were getting a little serious. He’s a good dude. I’m happy for him.”

“Me, too, if you are, dude.” Bill starts walking again, and Ted falls into step with him. “You - haven’t met anybody since you got divorced then?”

“Oh, no way,” Ted says with a laugh. “In Anchorage? I just try to like, keep the store open and keep Billie in school.” He nudges Bill back with his elbow. “What about you, dude? Travelling everywhere, seeing all kinds of cool stuff. Do you meet people? Or is Thea's mom still in the picture? I bet you’ve got all kinds of cool stories - trust me, Alaska’s so boring, dude.”

“Well mostly I just see the inside of studios and venues, dude,” Bill tells him, shrugging a little. Ted nudges him again, though, and he laughs. “Okay, well - I met Jo in England, but it was like - I wasn’t there for long. And I think we were both still - figuring some stuff out. So when she got pregnant we had a whole talk and I moved there for a while, to help her out, and take care of Thea, and then we’ve like - stayed friends, but that’s all. Thea and I see her whenever we’re there, and sometimes she comes to visit us, if it works out. But she’s not really ‘in the picture.’ And I’m way too busy to meet anybody, dude, seriously. I tell Missy that all the time, but I don’t know if she believes me.”

It makes him happier than it should to hear that Bill’s still single, too. Beyond that - he’s happy to hear that Bill and Missy have stayed in touch, too, because he always liked Missy. It’s easy to pretend that’s the reason behind his smile. “Is Missy still in San Dimas?”

“Yeah, dude! We just saw her like, yesterday, she helped me and Thea decorate the tree, and sometimes she comes over for Hanukkah, too. She’s - not exactly my mom, you know, but even after she and Dad split she was always nice. Checked in with my music and stuff, watches Thea if I need her to.”

“I’m glad she’s okay,” Ted says genuinely, pausing to look at one of the light fixtures. Up ahead, Billie and Thea have stopped, too, settling on a bench to talk, so Ted just lets himself stare at one of the big trees, all covered in colors. The sun has totally set now, and everything is beautiful. “I really - I missed San Dimas, you know? Like a lot. I took Billie to that diner by the high school, and I took her to Capone’s today, that old pizza place. Coming here was her idea, but this place, and my old bedroom at my dad’s I just - this still kind of feels like home, you know? Even though things are different. It’s really nice to be back.”

“Are you - thinking of staying?” Bill asks, stepping up beside Ted, leaning on the railing by the tree.

Ted turns his head, blinking. “Oh - well. I don’t know. I’ve got the store and - this is B’s first time leaving Alaska, you know? I’d feel kind of bad just - moving her here. But I guess - if she liked it. If it felt like I had reasons to stay, maybe.”

Bill smiles, but there’s something a little sad around the edges. “That’s cool you’ve got your own record store, dude. Owning your own business and stuff.”

Huffing out a laugh, Ted shakes his head. “Yeah, I guess. It was just - the only thing I could figure out how to do on my own up there to still do something with music. My dad hates it, always says it’s not a real job. We turn a profit, though. And it - kind of lets me keep up with music news. Find out what you’re up to and stuff,” Ted mumbles, turning his head at the end in the hopes that Bill won’t really hear him.

“You - kept up with my music stuff?”

He shrugs. “Just if I saw anything, you know. Tour news or your name in the liner notes or something. It was cool to see you were still playing. Being successful and stuff.” He turns, leaning against the railing beside Bill, nudging him as he watches his face. “I’m proud of you, dude.”

“Thanks, Ted,” Bill says softly. He opens his mouth to say something again, but they get interrupted when Billie and Thea come running back over to them.

“Dads, look!” The girls say in unison, and Ted looks over to where they’re pointing - at some kind of banner in the park. He steps a little closer, and squints - and finds an ad for a holiday concert. At first he doesn’t quite get it, until he realizes the advertisement isn’t just for the concert - the concert is some kind of holiday Battle of the Bands. Ted is absolutely certain that wasn’t a thing when he still lived in San Dimas.

“What is it, girls?” Bill asks, clearly struggling to figure out what they’re getting at.

“They’re having a Battle of the Bands at the park for Christmas! You guys should totally enter!” Thea tells him, and Billie nods with her.

“You guys would win, most definitely,” Billie says to back her up.

Ted laughs and shakes his head. “You haven’t even heard us play, B.”

“But you’re still really good, Dader!” Billie tells him insistently.

He glances over at Bill, and finds that he’s still blinking at the girls, so instead Ted just sighs and crouches down a little. “It’s a nice idea, girls, but Thea - your dad and I haven’t played together in a really long time. And he’s a professional, and I’m - not, B. I don’t think he’d wanna play with  _ me _ of all people in front of a crowd at the end of the month.” 

“I mean - why not, dude?” Bill asks quietly.

Surprised, Ted stands up so fast his head spins a little, and he shakes his head to try and clear it. “Huh?”

“We’d have to rehearse and stuff but - why not? Get the band back together?”

Glancing back at the girls smiling at them, Ted turns away a little bit and ducks his head closer to Bill. “Dude - I only play for like - fun, by myself. I haven’t played in front of anybody other than Billie since high school, when we were both still really bad. I’m not-” Ted flushes, struggling with his words. “If you wanna start a band, dude, I bet you know a lot of people that are way better than me.”

Looking up at Ted, Bill shrugs. “I don’t wanna play with those people, dude. I mean - if it turns out we’re still really bad, we don’t gotta play in the actual show, but - we could try playing together again anyways, right?”

Standing face to face like this means really meeting Bill’s eyes again - and it’s obvious he really means what he’s saying. His brows are all drawn up, and his smile, quirked up on one side, has a hopeful edge. It’s like the first time Bill ever asked if he wanted to start a band, or got his opinion on the logo, or a shirt design. Ted’s heart speeds up just the same way.

Bill reaches out and wiggles his fingers right by Ted’s hand, waiting.

Ted laughs, reminded of the fact that he’s never really been able to say no to Bill, and wiggles their fingers together in their signature little handshake. “Okay, dude. If you want.”

“Yes!” Billie and Thea say together, and Ted turns to catch them hi-fiving. He and Bill stand there together, elbows brushing, and laugh as they watch their daughters start talking excitedly about the concert - and a warmth spreads through Ted’s chest.

He has the passing thought, as they keep walking through the lights together, all four of them - that San Dimas suddenly feels more like home than Anchorage ever has.

**Author's Note:**

> BOY THIS IS LATE HUH. SORRY. and also it's. not done yet BUT HEY IT'S THAT HALLMARK AU I'VE BEEN TALKING ABOUT. i'm still working and hope to have the whole thing done soon but. as an apology for it being so late i wanted to post it in parts so it's not ALL so late. so here's the first part! PLEASE let me know if you enjoyed it! i hope to have part 2 (which should be the final part!) done as soon as i can. in the mean time, i hope this was cozy. find me as always on twitter @eddykaspbraks


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